


A Sliver to Call Mine

by kakumei



Series: Things I Wouldn't Do (But Did) [4]
Category: Saints Row
Genre: Anxiety, Implied Sexual Content, M/M, Minor Violence, Short One Shot, Unrequited Love
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2015-10-15
Updated: 2015-10-15
Packaged: 2018-04-26 11:10:56
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,128
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/5002507
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/kakumei/pseuds/kakumei
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>"...While Angelo sat there, in a tiny apartment in Shivington, watching the slight rise and fall of Dex’s chest from across the room, he could feel the bleeds and margins framing the scene he imagined for himself. A perfect, ink-washed scene, where Dex woke up with a smile and the twinkle in his eye which only appeared when some grand scheme resided in his head. He’d quip some witty one-liners, ones inspiring a flow of blood to certain parts. Then naturally, at least as the script called for it, the scene would progress to Dex pinning Anjo against the floor, his mouth on his neck... "</p>
            </blockquote>





	A Sliver to Call Mine

_"I want you, thin fingers_   
_I wanted you, thin fingernails_   
_And when you bend backwards_   
_I wanted you, I needed you_   
_Oh-oh, to make me better."_

* * *

 

      Nothing processed but the rush of adrenaline pounding through Anjo’s head. A wave of panic and anxiety filtered out the smell of burning metal, rubber, and human remains as he ripped through Stilwater’s streets in a black, unmarked Eiswolf.

      Dex shouted from the passenger seat, the accomplice--no, the mastermind of their plans. He knew when Monroe’s funeral procession would cross Lombard Street and align into the perfect spot for assassination. He picked the getaway cars. He organized the backup crews holding back their incensed pursuers from the crime scene. He knew the route back to the safehouse, barking directions at every intersection they crossed. And Anjo followed obediently, not because the rush of adrenaline impaired him from self-direction, but because he trusted Dex’s ultimate wisdom to keep the both of them alive.

      The police sirens prevailed in their deafening noise, but they made it to the safehouse unharmed. Dex had watched the last patrol cars trail away from their path, lost in the chaos he’d planned with meticulous precision. At least, that’s what he said had happened--Anjo never once looked at the rearview mirror, too frightened to peel his eyes from the road ahead of him. Dex told him to park in front of an unfamiliar apartment complex, and Anjo listened. He broke out in a raspy, exhilarated laugh, clapping Anjo’s trembling shoulders with a firm hand; the blow triggered Anjo’s lungs and suddenly he felt like he could breathe again. Then he lost his breath altogether, because he realized Dex touched him, and his head didn’t stop pounding like it should have in the calm of their remote location.

      The two men hid their car and fled into one of the apartments, Dex scrambling for the keys like he paid for the water and gas there on the regular. He bolted the door and pulled back the window curtains with relaxed grace, as if his thin fingers were parting gossamer threads of hair.

      “The damn feds have no clue where we are. I’d say our hit’s a success.” He beamed his pearly whites with cocky assurance. “I think we’ve proven the point the Saints are people you shouldn’t fuck with.”

      He peeled back his jean jacket and draped it over the dusty recliner, one of the few pieces of furniture in the apartment. “Want a beer? I’m sure there’s a couple 40s stashed in the fridge.”

      Anjo shook his head. “I’m not thirsty.” That was a lie. His racing nerves and their adrenaline-filled getaway had left him parched.

      “Suit yourself,” Dex said with a shrug. “After all this excitement, all I wanna do is relax and unwind. Johnny’s probably brewing a shitstorm out there, so I wanna be good and ready when it’s time for me to sort through it.”

      “‘Relax?’ ‘Unwind?’” Angelo forced a grin. “You the Dex I know, or are you fucking with me?”

      “Man, shut your goddamn mouth.” Dex tossed a pillow at Anjo’s shoulder. “Seriously. Watch the phone. Manny will call any second, but I wanna get some shuteye before we hit phase two of our plan.”

      He sank into the recliner, propping up the foot stand with a satisfied sigh, and shut his eyes.

      Anjo had never seen Dex look so ... content. And after counting the number of times his broken wristwatch pedalled between 11:35 and 11:34 am over and over again, Anjo realized he also had never spent this much time alone with Dex. He shifted uncomfortably in his seat, his clammy hands fidgetting over his lap. Temptation suggested he say something. Anything. But he felt at a loss for words. Thinking about the Saints and their next move against the city struck fear in his heart, more so since he had been designated the gang’s figurehead after Julius’ disappearance.

      Then, of course, came the realization that Angelo did not want to break the silence at all.

      Angelo liked comic books. Not enough to have lived his teen years in a suburban nerd dungeon, but he’d flipped though enough of his father’s collection to understand how a sequence of images could command fantasy, and how carefully patterned words across a page created the illusion of time. Those stories didn’t end until your eyes tracked through every dialogue bubble on the page. And while Angelo sat there, in a tiny apartment in Shivington, watching the slight rise and fall of Dex’s chest from across the room, he could feel the bleeds and margins framing the scene he imagined for himself. A perfect, ink-washed scene, where Dex woke up with a smile and the twinkle in his eye which only appeared when some grand scheme resided in his head. He’d quip some witty one-liners, ones inspiring a flow of blood to certain parts. Then naturally, at least as the script called for it, the scene would progress to Dex pinning Anjo against the floor, his mouth on his neck.

      But ... that was just a sequence of images in Anjo’s head. The real Dex had broken into a snore, his visor covering his eyes and his hands twitching oddly like they were finishing the blueprints left back on his desk. The real Anjo sat on a seat best described as a large cushion on a couch frame covered with tattered cloth. The floor didn’t look safe enough to walk on, let alone look comfortable for a love affair which would never happen.

      He flipped through the burner phone Dex gave him during his first week as a Saint, the one which would ring when the business with Monroe boiled over on Johnny’s end. He really, really didn’t want the phone to ring, but the truth was that it would. It was dialogue already set in motion.

      The thought of shutting the phone off, or at least turning it to silent, looked more and more like an attractive option. Because then time would move forward only if Anjo set the dialogue down himself and let the words he’d been holding back for so long out in the real world, after months of holding his feelings in and letting them fester into bouts of nausea and uncontrollable heart palpitations. He could keep himself and Dex together only in a quiet, delusional stasis, one existing only in the ether and preserved with silence.

      But, to his disappointment, that was mere fantasy. Reality, on the other hand, made him feel ashamed and embarrassed for his grandiose dreams. Reality decided, then and there, that the burner phone needed to ring. And Anjo couldn’t deny reality any more than he could find the courage to master his own narrative.

**Author's Note:**

> Thank you to Hunnybadgerv for the beta work! This was inspired by the Decemberists' "Make You Better," if you couldn't tell by the lyric in the top-notes and the title of this fic x)


End file.
